


If The Fates Allow

by amethystfox, ayerlind



Series: I Could Live a Little More [18]
Category: Men's Football RPF
Genre: Christmas, Christmas Fluff, Christmas Morning, Fluff, Gazzaweireld, Jinks, M/M, Mertigne, POV: Dries, POV: Jan, POV: Toby, this is seriously so fluffy
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-30
Updated: 2020-12-30
Packaged: 2021-03-11 03:07:16
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,270
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28438113
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/amethystfox/pseuds/amethystfox, https://archiveofourown.org/users/ayerlind/pseuds/ayerlind
Summary: Christmas 2019Snapshots from Christmas Day with our heroes.
Relationships: Jan Vertonghen/Harry Winks, Lorenzo Insigne/Dries Mertens, Toby Alderweireld/Paulo Gazzaniga
Series: I Could Live a Little More [18]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1621807
Comments: 1
Kudos: 10





	If The Fates Allow

**Author's Note:**

> This piece references events in [Crazy For You](https://archiveofourown.org/works/25774003/chapters/62598001), [Elements In The Air](https://archiveofourown.org/works/28435779), and [All I Want For Christmas Is You](https://archiveofourown.org/works/27896581).

25 December 2019  
London

Jan blinked awake with a start at the earsplitting shriek that shattered the silence of his still-dark bedroom. 

_"Mama! Papa! Sinterklaas came!"_

Next to him he felt Sophie jerk awake as well, then let out a groan of despair. "Kids are up," she mumbled groggily.

Jan just grunted in reply, stretching his body out to full length under the covers, feeling his feet push off the foot of the bed. He relaxed with a sigh and turned his head to drop a kiss on Sophie's sleep-mussed hair.

"Merry Christmas," he murmured, and felt rather than heard her hum against his chest in answer. She kissed his skin softly and was about to reply when the door to their bedroom flew open with a bang that made them jump.

"Mama!" Leyla burst into the room with a squeal. "Papa! Presents, get up, get up, get up, there's _presents!"_

She finished off her tirade with a flying leap into the middle of the bed, landing squarely on top of Jan, who had just begun to sit up. She hardly weighed a thing, but her momentum still made him fall back against the pillows, the breath whooshing from his lungs.

_"Oof._ Good morning, my little cannonball," he wheezed, brushing her hair out of his face, trying to wrangle her without throwing an elbow out to either side, mindful that he wasn't alone in the bed. "Merry Christmas."

"Merry Christmas," she chirped back, just as Ilay came running into the room full speed. Rather than jump onto the bed as his sister had done, though, he instead just ran smack into the side of the bed with an almighty thump and bounced off, giggling madly.

"Christmas, Christmas, Christmas," he chanted, hopping up and down in place. "Mama, Papa, it's _Christmas."_

"Really?" Jan said, feigning astonishment. "I had no idea."

"You did too!" Leyla squawked indignantly. "You just said Merry Christmas!"

"Caught, I suppose," he answered mournfully, aiming a gentle pinch at her ribs. She giggled and squirmed, and in doing so jostled Jan enough to throw him off balance, tipping him to one side, and onto the warm body snuggled against that side of him.

"Go 'way," came a moan from under the pillow. "M'still tired."

"Harry!" Leyla shrieked directly in Jan's ear, making him wince. "Get up, it's Christmas! You have to come open presents!"

"Presents!" Ilay yelled right along with her, still jumping up and down. "Presents, presents, presents!"

"Okay, that's enough," Sophie said sharply. "Kitchen, both of you. You need breakfast, and I'm not opening presents without coffee." She slid out of bed, wrapped herself up in her dressing gown, and shooed the kids out of the room. 

"Don't dawdle too much, boys," she threw back over her shoulder before the door closed behind her with a soft click.

Jan dropped back onto the bed with a sigh, then rolled onto his side and gently tugged at the pillow Harry was still stubbornly clutching over his head. "Come on, baby," he said around a yawn. "No sleeping in, not in this house."

"Bugger that," was the muffled reply. "I've slept in here loads of times."

"Yes, but those times, Ley didn't know you were here," Jan said sweetly. "You're the one who wanted to tell her we wanted to have a sleepover."

"It's too early," Harry whined. "You kept me up too late."

Jan snorted. "As if you would have rather been asleep? I thought you were enjoying yourself last night."

The only answer Jan got to that at first was a half-hearted wiggle and a faint but dreamy sigh. "Well, maybe…"

Jan leaned over and snatched the pillow away, taking advantage of Harry's momentary distraction at the reminder of precisely what had kept them up so late last night. "Come on, Sleeping Beauty. Presents…" he said as suggestively as he could manage on only a few hours' sleep. 

As he had suspected, that perked Harry up, enough at least to arrest the scowl on his face, but he still stuck his tongue out at Jan, just on principle. Jan gave a snort of laughter and bent to kiss him, then pulled away to retrieve his own dressing gown. 

"Come on, baby," he repeated, tying the sash securely around his waist. "I got some fresh danishes from that place Chris recommended, or I could even make you beans on toast, if you ask nicely enough." 

When Harry didn't answer, Jan gave him a gentle swat on the bottom, followed by an even gentler tap on the cheek. "If you don't get up, though, I'll send Ley back in here and let you tell _her_ you'd rather sleep than open presents with her."

"Wanker," Harry grumbled as he shoved himself up into a sitting position.

"And Merry Christmas to you too," Jan said with an evil little chuckle, pulling Harry to his feet and kissing him lightly before steering him out the door.

***

When the doorbell rang, Toby went to answer it with a definite spring in his step, and he knew that he was grinning like an idiot before he even pulled it open.

He couldn't help it, really. Christmas had always been his favourite holiday, and now that he was a father it had only become even more magical, experiencing it all for the first time again through her eyes. But even the sheer delight of watching his daughter opening her presents on Christmas morning hadn't been enough to completely override the excitement that had been bubbling in his belly all morning, waiting for _this._

"Hi," he said, feeling almost shy, ducking his head, well aware that he was blushing, but he was smiling, too.

"Hello, _liefje,"_ Paulo said warmly, stepping over the threshold, Patricia just behind him. Paulo was carrying a large covered dish in his arms, while Patricia was loaded down with beautifully wrapped packages, her small arms hardly able to contain them all. Toby closed the door behind them carefully and looked up just in time to meet Paulo's eyes for a moment before Paulo's lips were on his, only for a heartbeat, but it was enough to warm Toby down to his toes. He was so distracted by it that he hardly felt Patricia press a kiss to his cheek, even though he smiled and kissed her cheek back and took the gifts from her arms, ushering them into the sitting room.

Paulo carefully set down the dish he was carrying on the sideboard, then went straight to where Shani was firmly ensconced in her favourite chair, bending to kiss her cheek and ask how she was feeling. It always made Toby want to giggle when he saw Paulo like this-- his tall, confident Dom fussing over his wife as if pregnancy was a brand new concept to him. But then, Toby supposed, maybe to him it was. They hadn't exactly discussed it, but he had gotten the impression that _if_ Paulo and Patricia intended to have kids, it wasn't likely to be soon.

It was almost too bad, he thought wistfully, watching how adorable Paulo was, getting down on the floor to play with Ayla. He was amazing with her, had gotten her to warm to him with remarkable speed, considering how shy she generally was with new people. It was hard for Toby to wrap his head around how someone who clearly liked kids as much as Paulo did could possibly not want his own-- but, he reminded himself, it wasn't his place to second guess anyone else's choices, even if he didn't really understand them.

He just stood there for a moment, drinking in the sight of his family and his boyfriend-- one of them, at any rate-- together at Christmas. He could feel his heart swelling in his chest almost painfully, sending a wave of dizziness through him. He had to close his eyes to keep from getting overwhelmed, only opening them again when he felt a light touch on his arm.

_"¿Estas bien, conejito?"_ Patricia was looking at him with concern on her face.

"Uh-- yes, sure," Toby stammered, trying to disguise the blush he could feel spreading across his face by collecting the dish Paulo had set on the sideboard and hurrying into the kitchen with it.

One of Patricia's eyebrows went up, and she followed after him silently. Toby avoided meeting her eyes for as long as he could, setting the dish down on the stovetop, intending to let the heat radiating from the oven keep it warm until they were ready to eat. He couldn't do anything about the heat radiating from his face, though.

"Do you want to talk about it?" she asked gently.

"What? Oh, no, n-no, it's nothing…" He tried to keep his eyes down, not wanting to spoil the sweetness of the holiday by getting overwhelmed and causing a fuss.

To his surprise, Patricia reached out and put her small fingers under his chin, firmly lifting his face to look at her.

"It's okay," she said softly. "You don't have to tell me, but if it's something you don't want to say to Paulo…" She left it unfinished, but the offer was implicitly clear.

He squirmed with embarrassment. "It's not that," he mumbled. "I just…" He stopped short, fumbling for words that didn't seem to want to come. "I'm just… happy," he said at last.

"Well, it's good, to be happy, no?"

Toby dropped his eyes again. "Maybe too happy," he whispered.

Patricia looked baffled by that. "Too happy?" she repeated. "How…?"

Toby chewed on his lip, unsure how to explain it any better than that. How could he describe the way that watching Paulo play with his daughter made him feel? The way it felt to share his favourite holiday, his favourite day of the year with Paulo? He couldn't. He could feel his throat beginning to tighten, which was strange, because he wasn't sad, not in the slightest.

Startling both of them, Paulo chose that moment to stride purposefully into the kitchen-- but he didn’t actually look at them at all. As if he didn’t even realise they were there, his eyes scanned the half of the kitchen that included the breakfast table, and then his face lit up. He went to the table, plucked a somewhat haggard-looking, well-loved stuffed dog out of the seat of the highchair beside it, and then headed right back where he came from, although he did shoot them a grin, holding it up victoriously before he disappeared.

Toby stared after him for the space of a second, then looked back down into Patricia’s warm, caring eyes-- and he really wasn’t sure whether the strangled noise that he let out was a laugh or a sob. 

She slipped her arms around his waist and squeezed him in a brief hug. "It's okay," she said quietly. "You don't have to say it, not to me. But maybe you _should_ say it to him, yes?"

"I can't," he mumbled. The idea of it was terrifying, at least as much so as the thought of saying it to Jan was. He had never been brave, not in this, had never been able to be the one to say it first, had never been able to squash his fear of rejection enough for that.

"Maybe he surprise you, if you give him the chance," she offered. 

Toby sighed. "Maybe," he acknowledged. "But…" He broke off and chewed on his lip for a moment, thinking. "I'm not ready."

"That's okay too," she said reassuringly. "Sometimes it take time, no? Just… maybe don't wait too long."

With a last squeeze of his arm and a friendly wink, she followed Paulo back out into the living room, leaving Toby to stare after her, his heart pounding and mind racing.

He took a deep, steadying breath, taking a moment to get a grip on himself again, determined to go back out there and enjoy the rest of the day with them, and try not to let the fact that he was falling in love with Paulo distract him from the joy of Christmas any further.

***

"Move over," came a sleepy voice. Dries grumbled and opened his eyes a little, just enough to aim a scowl at Lorenzo. 

"You had plenty of room over there," he grumbled, not budging from where he was spread out on the couch, somehow taking up the full length of it despite his relatively small size. He nodded sleepily at the loveseat where Lore had been sprawled a moment ago.

"Don't care," was the stubborn answer, and Lore pouted at him, nudging and shoving at him until Dries gave up and scooted over enough to let Lore lie down with him. He fully intended to drift right back into his half-doze once Lore got settled, too warm and comfortable to do much else. Christmas dinner had, as always, been an extravagant affair at the Insigne house, and Dries was just barely on the right side of being _too_ full. The wine hadn't helped, only making him even more inclined to spend the rest of the day napping on the couch.

He gave a long, contented sigh now and wrapped an arm around Lorenzo, pulling him close and pressing a kiss to the back of his head. He was just beginning to fade out again when his phone went off, trilling obnoxiously on the end table, just barely out of reach. Lore jumped slightly and swiped one hand at it clumsily, swearing under his breath when he accidentally elbowed Dries in the shoulder in his efforts to reach and silence it.

"It's Jan," he grumbled, passing the phone to Dries and dropping back into his more comfortable position with a sigh. Underneath the post-holiday-meal grogginess, though, Dries could hear a slightly sharper edge to Lore's voice-- he still hadn't fully forgiven Jan for the "Harry incident," despite Dries's repeated requests that he let it go. Dries _had_ forgiven Jan, though, and while he appreciated how fierce Lore could be when it came to what he thought of as protecting Dries, in this instance he would have preferred a little less ferocity.

"Merry Christmas, Jantje," he said with a genuine smile once he had accepted the call and the screen was taken up with Jan's beautiful, smiling face.

_"Merry Christmas, kitten,"_ Jan answered. _"Hang on, I added Paulo and Toby too."_

He had hardly finished saying so before the screen divided, with the new section showing Paulo and Toby snuggled together on a couch, Paulo running his long fingers absently through Toby's remarkably gel-free hair.

Dries grinned with delight. "Hey, you two. Merry Christmas."

_"Feliz Navidad, gatito,"_ Paulo rumbled in reply. _"How are you?"_

"Mmm, pretty good," Dries answered, wiggling a little and biting his lip. "Missing you already. All of you," he added hastily. He had started sleeping with both Toby and Paulo in the last couple of months-- well, in Paulo's case, the last couple of days-- and he didn't want to let Jan think he was only talking to one of them, given how jealous he had gotten about Toby, at least.

_"Did you have an okay trip back to Italy?"_ Toby asked with a fond smile, his blue eyes soft-- a welcome improvement from the brittle tension that had existed between them for a long time.

"Not too bad," he responded. "It's always nice to come back here." He squeezed Lore gently, tilting the phone so that the others could see his drowsy Italian boyfriend nestled against him.

"Anything you feel like translating?" Lore grumbled.

"Just telling them how much I love having you to come home to," Dries replied in Italian, nuzzling the nape of Lore's neck.

_"Gracias por el panettone, Lorenzo,"_ Paulo said, and it was close enough to Italian that Dries knew Lore would understand. _"Estaba delicioso."_

Lore perked up at that. "You're welcome," he said, aiming a genuine smile at Paulo. "My wife made it, did Dries tell you? She makes the best panettone in all Italy." There was a note of pride in Lore's voice now, making Dries warm from head to toe as he translated for Paulo-- there were few things he enjoyed more than seeing the people he loved talk about the people _they_ loved.

He didn't miss the slight pout that had appeared on Jan's face, though. "How about you, Groot? Have anything special for Christmas dinner?"

Jan shrugged, blushing a little. "Nothing to compare with Jenny's panettone, I'm sure, but it was nice. Sophie went out of her way to get some of my favourites from home, and Harry brought over a pie that his mum had made." He bit his lip at the end of that sentence, as if he hadn't really planned to say that.

Dries's heart skipped a beat. He still hadn't really figured out how to feel about Harry, hadn't had any actual interaction with him since the disastrous moment when he had first seen the young Englishman stroll by in the background of another video call with Jan, naked as a jaybird. He wasn't opposed to the idea of Jan having another boyfriend-- obviously-- but the lingering feeling that Harry was a younger, more accessible version of Dries himself had never entirely gone away. He knew with the logical part of his brain that Jan wasn't replacing him with Harry, but it was hard to shake the insecurity nonetheless.

"And did Harry have a nice Christmas too?" he made himself ask. He stopped himself from adding, _Is he there with you now?_

_"I think so. He's in the other room now, playing with the kids,"_ Jan said hesitantly.

The urge to make a snide comment about Harry playing with the kids because he was hardly more than a kid himself nearly overwhelmed Dries, but he swallowed it down, forced it out of his mind. He knew Jan was sensitive about the age gap, and the last thing any of them needed was another row, especially on Christmas.

A glance at Paulo and Toby told him that this was an uncomfortable topic for them as well, so he cast about for a way to change the subject. It wasn't lost on him that Harry's absence from the group Facetime was certainly not a coincidence-- he had gathered that there were issues between Harry and all of Jan's other boyfriends. It worried him, to be honest; it didn't seem particularly healthy. But it was Jan's business, and Dries had been doing this long enough to know when to leave well enough alone.

"Did the kids get what they wanted for Christmas?" To Dries's surprise, it was Lore who piped up. Despite the language barrier, Lorenzo had clearly picked up on the mention of Harry's name and the awkwardness that followed, and despite his own feelings about the situation, had reacted faster than any of the rest of them to move past it. A surge of love for the tiny, perfect man in his arms overwhelmed Dries, only for a moment, before he could translate the question for the others.

As he listened to Jan and Toby chatting back and forth with Lorenzo about their kids, only interjecting to translate, the warmth spread all through Dries's body, filling him with happiness to the tips of his toes. No, things weren't completely perfect in their little circle, and Dries had no idea if or when some of those issues might be resolved. But one way or another, they were all in this together because of love, and on Christmas day, that was all that mattered.

**Author's Note:**

> A little late for Christmas, but this was a lot of fun to write 😍 Hope all of you have had a nice Christmas, or other winter holidays, or just December, whatever applies to you. Here's to the end of 2020! To quote the Counting Crows, maybe this year will be better than the last. 💜


End file.
